Virtual Reality

Got a phone upgrade the other day, they chucked in a 'free' VR headset. I wasn't that bothered about it but trying it out I've been pretty amazed by how good it is - and this isn't even a specialist VR like PlayStation VR and Oculus Rift.

Now I guess what you're all thinking is - 'he went straight for the porn'. And you'd be right. And it's a really WEIRD experience. Totally uncanny - the feeling when a face or (ahem) other body part gets right up to your face is impossible to describe except by saying that it's like when a REAL face/body part gets close to yours, except you know it's an illusion. (And of course you can't touch.) I felt like I was in a sci fi film - aroused but disturbed.

Other than that, the best thing I've found so far is the Netflix app which transports you into an idealised living room with a gigantic TV. Headphones in and you begin to see that cinemas might be doomed!

Anyway, I figure this is an interesting topic of conversation, because it's bound to have a big effect on people's lives once it becomes a mass-adopted technology.

It's already quite disturbing how isolated technology is making people and I can see this being an even more powerful tool for escapism. The 'Red dwarf' idea of 'Better than Life', a VR game that addicts people like heroin, seems pretty plausible now.

I had a go on this 'experience'/game/whatever it is https://creators.vice.com/en_uk/arti...ental-hospital a couple of years back. and it scared the bejeezus out of me. Not just cos the effects were good, but because of how immersive it will be when they get the visuals just right. Which they may have done in the two intervening years.

I can see the rationale for VR as a therapeutic tool in modelling real life situations, or situations that could not be conjured in real life. But the possibility for things going wrong seems epic. We've been discussing this at work a bit lately in connection with a project, and I find the lack of reflection about long term safety really unnerving. As if people are blinded by the newness of the technology...

VR porn sounds mental. Presumably they're, ahem, hard at work in developing the VR-compatible gloves so that not being able to touch is no longer an issue?